The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face
by marmota-b
Summary: They found each other in a big city and found a joy that could sustain a world. / Drabbles, half-drabble, three-sentence. Inspired by and based on the song of the same name, but NOT a songfic.


_This story was first posted on Archive of Our Own as part of the Madness Round of Narnia Fic Exchange 2014. Written for snitchnipped and redsnake05 who both asked for Frank and Helen._

_I wrote a romance. Oops! Well, if ever I were to write a romance, it would definitely be something like this._

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><p><strong>The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face<strong>

The first time Frank saw Nellie's face, sun was rising in her eyes as she stood in front of Covent-garden market with her basket of apples. Her flaxen hair was bound in a simple braid thrown over her shoulder, she had a little straw hat on and she was light and shining like nothing Frank had seen before in the dark and endless city. Then she turned just enough to notice him looking, smiled brightly, and offered one of her apples – her living, Frank knew, and dearly paid for before in hopes of selling for a little more – to Strawberry.

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><p>They first kissed in a park; it was a Sunday and her hair was pinned up, like a cage for the birds singing around and surely a cage for Frank's heart, long captive by then. She had got a job as laundress, so they no longer met in the mornings and sought each other's company whenever they could. Now Frank had even more reason to seek her presence, because everything had changed then, even as everything continued as it had been: he could do anything, he could move mountains; Nellie loved him and he would be worthy of her love.<p>

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><p>They married the next Spring in the small chapel in their neighbourhood; Nellie moved in with him and his parents, not adding much to fill their small living space really, mostly clothes. But she also brought all her warmth, all her willingness for work and love which she had so generously shared with Frank already and now with his parents, too. And then he held her close, so close, her heart beating at his chest, his beating at hers; he was certain that the joy they had could sustain a world and that there would be a happily ever after.<p>

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><p>The first time Frank saw Helen's face in Narnia, there was, once again, bright golden light reflected in her eyes. But this time, it was not the sun. This time, it was more, and all the promises of more he had always seen in her suddenly began to make sense.<p>

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><p><em>And here's a note almost as long as the story:<em>

_I started developing a backstory for Helen and Frank that involved him being the country transplant rather lost in the city, with solid if simple Christian upbringing, and her being a poor but cheerful and ambitious and kind street seller. They would first meet in the mornings while he was waiting around with his cab. It drew on a text I read last semester, about street sellers and workers in Victorian London. But the idea felt like something that would require too much research, from things like the street layout of Victorian London as related to class to the fact that we do not even know when exactly The Magician's Nephew takes place (I'm picky about historical accuracy and things changed a lot in matter of decades); too much to manage it in the short amount of time allowed by the challenge._

_Then suddenly, somehow, the idea of "first time" and meeting in the mornings – I think, because it was a very quick, snap realisation – clicked together with the song "The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face" I'd been listening to, and instead of that story of working class people in rather bleak Victorian London, this happened._

_I love the people Frank and Nellie formed into in my head during this experiment, so I really want to come back to them one day. Maybe that other story will still happen, but probably not any time soon._

_Frank is very down to earth, but he definitely has a bit of a poetic bone. I bet he loves the Psalms and the Song of Songs when he gets to read or hear them._


End file.
